SATURDAY, AUGUST 6, 1887.

Waikato Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 2352, 6 August 1887, Page 2

SATURDAY , AUGUST 6, 1887.

Tine letter of Mr John Hutchinson, of Orakau, published in our issue of Thursday, on the rotation of crops, will have been read with as much interest by many as it was with pleasure by ourselves. One of the chief objects of this journal in writing on fanning matters is not to dogmatise but to awake discussion, and, from the variety of opinions and practical experieneo brought to tight, to give the intelligent settler the opportunity of formulating for his own use some special system of farming adapted to tho peculiarities of his own soil, and of its position, 'ter. .• s «' V .-ry practical man knows, ; ■■ as many varieties of rotations as there are different classes of soils. Position, too, as regards a market will also have a large say in the matter. So, also, will the size of the farm, as we shall point out on a future occasion. At the prestmt, management of larger holdings, farms of from IhO to 300 or 100 acres each, is being more specially discussed when either the four or live course rotations, or the two course rotation of our correspondent are referred to. There is much in what he urges

as the reason why the, two former rotations are practiced at home, namely, that meat is dear and grain cheap, and that the turnips and artificial grasses are grown not. so much as leading up to the production of grain as to the providing of winter food for cattle in a climate so different from that of New Zealand. Rut, years ago, before free trade brought down the price of grain to 40s a quarter, when wheat ranged from £3 to even £5 10s per quarter, in one or two years, or say from 7 s Gd to 8s 6d per bushel as a rule, and cuttle and moat were not more than half their present rates, the four course system had been fairly established in the eastern counties and elsewhere, where superior farming was the rule, the object being to maintain the fertility of the soil and largely, with a view to the production of grain. Artificial manures established'thc cultivation of the swede and turnip as a farm crop, and these have led in the mother country to the bringing into profitable cultivation vast tracts of land, inferior in every respect to the waste lands of Waikato. The turnip has the same mission to perform here, and that is why, to a large extent, we give preference to a four or five-course system on farms not naturally adapted to, or as yet brought up to the standard of such a course of cropping as that referred to by Mr Hutchinson. Some of our readers may be acquainted with a large tract of country lying between Lincoln and Stamford, on which now stands a column bearing the statue of a former Earl Fitzwilliam. Within the memory of man that column was a light-house by night and a beacon by day, to guide the traveller over a dreary waste, a vast rabbit warren of inferior land. The introduction of artificial manures and the cultivation of the turnip in the earlier half of the century, enabled the proprietor to make it what it was even forty years ago, one of the most fertile grain-growing districts in that part of the county. And the turnip will do as much for our waste lands in Waikato, aye, for the very poorest of them, so that in still advocating the four or five-course system, we may, nevertheless, be in perfect agreement with our esteemed correspondent in the matter of rotation. On good land, which will produce a crop of either clover or wheat, his system will undoubtedly suit the markets better than the five-course system, but where the land is not capable of doing this, and much land in Waikato is not up to that standard, a rotation of crops leading up to grain cultivation is, we believe, needed. And now, to the results. Let us take a farm of 200 acres in a failstate of cultivation, and estimate the returns and expenditure of work ing it on the five course system. That is, first year wheat, second year oats, third year rape sown in September and fed off by Christmas, ploughed again and put into Aberdeen turnips, sown with grass and fed oft' in May, June, and July, fourth and fifth years grass, the latter crop to be used either to graze stock for the butcher, for dairy farming or for a mixture of both, and if chiefly clover the after math instead of being cut or eaten should be ploughed in as manure, for (he succeeding crops. As clover derives exactly one half the food that produces it from the atmosphere, the farmer in ploughing it in for manure is subsidised £ for £ by nature in his manure bill. If then we were to divide a farm of 200 acres into five equal paddocks of 39 acres each, leaving five acres for the homestead, we should arrive at the returns as follows, allowing of course for the fluctuation in value of both grain and cattle, but remembering that there is a better prospect of a good average if the farm is systematically made to produce a variety of crops. Receipts : —Thirty-nine acres of wheat, 30 bushels per acre, at 4s, £234 ; straw, 39 tons at 20s, £39. Thirty-nine acres oats, for chaff, yielding 85 tons at £4 per ton, £340. Thirty-nine acres of rape with stolen crop of turnips to follow in same year, yielding return of 40s per acre, £7B. Seventy-eight acres of grass worth say 30s per acre, and more if near a cheese or butter factory, £ll7, total receipts, £BOB the expenditure will be as follows ; —Thirty-nine acres of wheat at £2 10s per acre, £97 10s. Thirtynine acres of oats at £2 10s per acre, £97 10s, four tons artificial manure, say £34. Thirty-nine acres of rape at 15s, and thirty-nine acres of turnips at 15s per acre, £SB 10s, seven tons of manure £56, allow £SO to put one paddock into grass each year, and calculate the rent or interest on value of the land at 7 4 per cent on £2OOO, namely, £l5O, and allow a further sum of £BO as interest on live or dead stock, insurance etc., and we have an annual expenditure of £623 10s, which, deducted from the gross receipts £BOB leaves a net profit of £174. What 200 acre farm in Waikato does this now, besides allowing £l5O per annum for the interest on capital invested in the land 1

In tho above expenditure wo have made no allowance for the cost of chaffing the oats, blacksmith work, and other small matters, but on the other hand have allowed nothing for the produce of the homestead of five acres, a portion of which would bo in orchard, for poultry, bacon, eggs, honey, and a variety of small matters which ought not to be below tbo farmer’s attention, and which would more than cover any incidental outgoings not enumerated in the above calculation. Nor do wo take into consideration that much 1 of the expenditure in producing the wheat and oat crops set down at £'2 10s per aero would return into the farmer’s pocket as the biro of his own teams and the labour of his family, but bare simply calculated

at tho cost of hired labour, as exexplainod in a previous article oa the subject of wheat growing. Neither has any allowance been in ado ‘ for supervision, shifting stock, Ac., because everything on a small farm of 200 acres, additional to the charges above allowed for could and ought to be done by the farmer and his family. A man in business who makes nearly £2OO over his working expenses would consider that amount his own salary for management, and the farmer is in a far hotter position, for ho gets half the living of his house from the surplusage of milk, butter, meat, grain and vegetables. In conclusion wo shall bo only too happy if correspondents like Mr Hutchinson will but take the trouble to criticise not only the principles of tho system wo propose, but our figures. There cannot be too much friendly discussion carried on with a view to elicit the truth on these matters.